How do we conduct a GREAT interview?

Finding inspiration with the "life interview"

The Life InterviewBy www.legacyproject.orgWe all live our own story. But too often we get stuck in little stories that fail to create real change or make a positive impact on our lives and others’. What we need to do is think about a bigger story. One way to do this is to interconnect the dots across generations and learn about others’ legacies. Legacy is an interconnection across time. Your life multiplied by time equals legacy. What can you learn from others’ legacies? And what will your legacy be one day? Why are life stories important? Talking, listening, asking and answering questions, sharing stories – communicating- that is how we learn more about ourselves, others, the world, and life. That's how people and human relationships grow. Doing a life interview is a chance to travel through time. In the present moment, the best gift you can give someone is to listen to them. You'll find out about the past as you hear about real-life experiences. And along the way, you may discover some timeless insights to help guide you through your own future. We live our lives forward, but we understand them backward. By interviewing people older than ourselves, we see how the story of someone’s life or a monumental experience in their life has turned out – then we have the gift of being able to change what we can for our future by the lessons we learn.

Tips from the Experts

Even the most extroverted among us know that being a good conversationalist doesn’t always come easy— but there are some experts who have had more practice than the rest of us. Writers, journalists and others who interview sources regularly have developed tried and true techniques that help them connect deeply with people.These communication tricks from legendary interviewers can help you conduct a stellar interview, build a new relationship or simply become the best conversationalist in the room.

1. PREPARE NOTES, THEN TOSS THEM

Good interviewers always study up on their subject’s background. But during the moment of truth, you rarely see a professional interviewer following a script or referring to notes. A better, more casual approach is to stay in the moment and allow talk to flow naturally, as TV talk show veteran Dick Cavett advises.

"My former boss and idol for many years as a viewer, Jack Paar, called me before I started doing a talk show and said, ‘Hey kid, don’t do interviews.’ And I said, ‘What do I do, then, sing or just read to the audience?’ And he said, ‘No, interviews are boring. That’s just ‘What’s your favorite color?’ and that’s dull. Make it a conversation.’ And that’s almost the best secret. Throw your notes aside, if necessary.’"

Asking open-ended questions allow for more freedom in the answers you receive and are more meaningful. Examples can include: Tell me about... Describe… What was it like…? When was...? In what ways...? Why...? and How...? Can you expand on…? Can you describe…? What was it like to…? If you realize you just asked a close-ended question (which prompt a person to give only a "yes" or "no") , try following up by asking the person to expand on their answer. Start with easy, friendly questions and work your way up to more difficult or sensitive questions.

"The more comfortable you make someone feel, the better interview you’re ultimately going to get," says interview veteran Katie Couric. And how do you make someone feel more comfortable? Great interviewers do it by meeting subjects on their level. That means matching their mood, energy level, language style—even body language.Calibrating your tone and energy level sets the stage for an evenly matched conversation and puts your subject at ease, while mirroring the body language of the person you’re speaking with is a nearly subliminal cue to show that you’re fully present in the conversation. Just keep it subtle.

A good interviewer knows how to make subjects comfortable enough to open up and reveal something real and true about themselves. When a pro interviewer feels a subject is holding something back on a particular topic, they’ll often use the power of silence at the end of the answer to draw out more information. Here’s how journalist Jim Lehrer describes it:

"If you resist the temptation to respond too quickly to the answer, you’ll discover something almost magical. The other person will either expand on what he’s already said or he’ll go in a different direction. Either way, he’s expanding his response, and you get a clear view into his head and heart."

3. PRACTICE FLEXIBLE LISTENING

What seems like the simplest part of holding a conversation or conducting an interview is often the trickiest. It’s listening—the right way.Skilled interviewers become adept at listening not just to the words their subject is saying but also the tone in which the words are said, the pauses and nuances of the answer and what’s being left unsaid.This active, flexible listening lets them know when to move onto a new subject and when the moment is ripe to probe a little deeper with a follow-up question.

Listen carefully to what the person says; don't interrupt or correct. Maintain eye contact and show interest by leaning forward and nodding. Talking to someone while they scan the room or gaze out the window is like trying to hit a moving target. Don’t be that person! ​You will also want to keep an open mind. Listen without jumping to conclusions. Remember that the speaker is using language to represent the thoughts and feelings inside his or her brain. You don’t know what those thoughts and feelings are and the only way you’ll find out is by listening. Listen to the words and try to picture what the speaker is saying. Concentrate on what is being said. If your thoughts start to wander, immediately force yourself to refocus.Asking follow-up questions that relate to what the speaker is saying is a great way to learn more about the important topics your interviewee wants to discuss and also shows you were paying attention.

All of these techniques are tried and true, but they don’t really work without one simple quality on the interviewer’s part: curiosity.A true passion for learning more about those around you goes further than any trick or even the most polished communication skills. Take it from Gay Talese, one of the legendary founders of literary journalism:

"I used to wander around. I never knew exactly what I was looking for. I knew vaguely what I hoped to find or I had some rough idea, but I was in the exploratory mode all the time … Just go out and discover and you’ll find by chance, by accident some terrific stories, some terrific people you never thought you would meet."

You can cultivate curiosity in your daily life by noticing more details, delving deeply into the ideas that grab your interest and being alert to those around you and what makes them light up.As Dale Carnegie famously explains, the beauty of curiosity is that it makes you nearly irresistible to everyone around you.

"You can make more friends in two months by becoming interested in other people than you can in two years by trying to get other people interested in you."

As my new podcast, Bootstrapped Web, gets off the ground, with interviews playing a big role, I’ve been giving this question lots of thought. Here are few things that I think separate the typical, run-of-the-mill web interview from the truly value-packed and engaging interviews:

Focus on a topicThe best interviewers have a specific objective when they set out to interview a guest. They invite them on the show for a reason. They pick out the most interesting topic that this guest can speak to, and make it their mission to get to the bottom of this topic over the course of the interview.​Background researchThe best interviewers will do their research on the guest, before they meet. They’ll learn everything there is to know about the guest. This lets them identify the most interesting and relevant areas to dig into. Without this background research, the interviewer is just grasping at straws, hoping to hit on something interesting.​​Prepared questions & unprepared followup questionsFirst, a good interviewer will have a list of prepared questions they plan to ask a guest. This is good because it prevents any awkward gaps in the conversation, and those annoying “lets see, what should I ask you next?” moments.But a great interviewer will be attentive enough to latch onto the guest’s answers, and dig in with followup questions based on what they’ve just said. This is a lot harder to do than it seems, because the interviewer must mentally prepare for the next question, while also listening closely and processing everything that the guest is saying.

Media personality Charlie Rose has been hailed by the Financial Times as “a brilliantly skilled interviewer”. If Rose is indeed, a “master at charming his subjects into revealing interesting pieces of information”, then perhaps there are lessons that can be learned from his countless hours of interviewing some of the world’s most interesting people. Rose gets his guest to take us step-by-step to a deeper understanding about whatever the topic is. You can’t come away from watching a Charlie Rose show and not feel smarter than you were an hour earlier. Studying his technique from multiple online interviews, I curated the best practices (there may be more) that should be emulated when conducting an interview:

Go Deeper.

To dive deeper in questioning one must have familiarity with the subject matter and the interviewee. Charlie Rose isn’t an expert in everything, but his breadth of knowledge allows him to show command of a specific topic and reach deeper with his line of questions than most interviewers.

Interviewing Style Matters

Charlie Rose has an almost casual bent to his interviews. His interviewing tone is meant to be conversational and even “cultured”. A writer from the Financial Times remarks how a two hour lunch with Charlie Rose “glided by, seamlessly and unnoticed”.

Listen and Learn

Sadly, many interviewers formulate their next question rather than listen to their interviewee answer the previous question. And that’s a real shame because an interview provides a gold mine of information for both parties. Interviewers should take a cue from Charlie Rose and really listen to the answers provided by candidates. It’s amazing what information can be gathered by truly listening when someone speaks!

Plan Short, Open-Ended Follow-Up Questions

“What do you mean? Why? Were you surprised? How did you get there?” That kind of thing. But what’s important is being able to listen to the answer and follow up in a smart way. Follow-up is crucial, listening is crucial and engagement is crucial. He thinks a lot about framing the question- more than most- and they are short and they are targeted to allow for a range of responses.

What is TED? TED is a nonprofit devoted to spreading ideas, usually in the form of short, powerful talks (18 minutes or less). TED began in 1984 as a conference where Technology, Entertainment and Design converged, and today covers almost all topics — from science to business to global issues — in more than 100 languages.​TED is a global community, welcoming people from every discipline and culture who seek a deeper understanding of the world. We believe passionately in the power of ideas to change attitudes, lives and, ultimately, the world. On TED.com, we're building a clearinghouse of free knowledge from the world's most inspired thinkers — and a community of curious souls to engage with ideas and each other, both online and at TED and TEDx events around the world, all year long.​

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